Attention is also turning to the failure of Mbeki and other African leaders to condemn the violence in Zimbabwe.

Ray Hartley, the editor of the Times of South Africa, is furious with Mbeki.

Writing on his blog, Hartley describes Mbeki's diplomatic attempts to resolve the crisis in Zimbabwe as "flaccid".

He says the South African president and other regional leaders "have not raised a finger to stop brazen election rigging and what now amounts to the theft of the run-off election by Mugabe's thugs".

Pleading with his country to act, he adds: "South Africa cannot stand by while elections are brazenly stolen and people campaigning in a democratic election are arrested, tortured and butchered. We must act to stop this horror."

Commenting on the talkboards of Cape Town's Mail & Guardian, Ken Nessy writes: "Thabo Mbeki will forever be remembered for his shameful disregard for the people of Zimbabwe."

The Guardian agrees, saying "Mbeki has been shamefully complicit in Mr Mugabe's survival". But it detects that opinion towards Mugabe is changing among southern African leaders, predicting that this could yet finish him off.

Don't hold your breath, says Dianna Games in South Africa's Business Day, arguing that "battered Zimbabweans can't pin hopes on the rest of Africa".

The African Union has today has expressed "grave concern" about the situation.

It's hardly a stinging criticism and, according to Games, the union "has done everything in its power to keep the Zimbabwe issue off the main agenda of discussions on the basis that it was 'divisive'."

She adds: "The Southern African Development Community's handling of the issue has been shameful, particularly the endorsement of blatantly rigged election after blatantly rigged election in Zimbabwe, giving the Zanu-PF government a veneer of acceptability."

This is echoed by Hope, blogging from Harare on Sokwenele: "I can't imagine how SADC can endorse Mugabe as Zimbabwe's leader and still retain any modicum of integrity in the eyes of the world as a body that takes peer review seriously.

"SADC - and especially Thabo Mbeki - has presided over and watched happen before their eyes."

Meanwhile Constatine Chiwenga, the Zanu-PF media sub-committee chairman, accused the opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, of trying to "hoodwink" the Zimbabwean electorate with the announcement that he would pull out of the election.

He told the state-run Herald newspaper. "As far as we are concerned, the situation in Zimbabwe does not warrant intervention from outside while the police are in control of the situation and the MDC attempts will not succeed."

This is an edited extract from the Wrap, our digest of the daily papers.